Sunday, July 07, 2013

"Beth,
the rust damage is too extensive. If we try to fix your brakes, it
will be like opening a whole can of worms. Fuel lines are
rusted...calipers...its just not worth it."

"But...what will I do with it?"

"We can send it to the junk yard."

"Okay,
um..." My voice starts to quiver. "I'll stop by and take the stuff out
of it on Tuesday." I put down the phone and let the news sink in: my
truck is finished.

Last week when heading on the island, I had
a near-miss accident. I had to slam on my brakes and flew onto the
shoulder of the road. The brakes made a horrible screaching sound
afterward and I had it towed to garage. I kinda knew it wouldn't just
be a mere brake line. It's a 1990 Toyota 4Runner with close to 200,000
miles on it. It's rusty and repairing it would be the proverbial
"throwing good money at bad."

Six years earlier, I bought the
truck for $2000. I had moved to the Jersey shore from New York and I
was pretty broke and not relishing the idea of making another monthly
payment to another large entity. So I bought the truck outright from a
local fisherman here. The first time I took it for a ride, I was in
love. It was a truck! Not some low-riding car...a truck! The little kid in me squealed with delight.

Some
people buy cars for status. Even if I had the means, that is not why I
buy a car. I buy it to safely get me from point A to point B. And it
helps if its cool and has some character. Which my truck did. It also
helps if you don't have to get tons of repairs on the damn thing. My
Toyota 4Runner ran like a charm for years, needing few repairs.

Growing
up, I remember my mother buying lemon after lemon. So many icy cold
mornings were spent with my mother cursing at the car because it
wouldn't start again. "Just my luck!" my mother would proclaim. And I
feared I'd have the same bad luck, like some genetic predisposition to
crappy cars.

But the bad luck I feared didn't stop at cars
unfortunately. I've often felt that I just wasn't very "lucky." I was
never going to secure that killer job or get the recognition I thought I
deserved as an artist. I wasn't going to find that perfect guy who'd
sweep me off me feet and stay with me for life. I wasn't going to have
tons of money; I was always going to struggle to get by. Bad messaging,
you might say, but sometimes when you have a tough childhood, you
sense a shitty pattern.

I remember listening to an interview
with Michael Stipe, the lead singer of REM. He credited his success to
his supportive parents who believed in him from day 1. He seemed built
for success and I've quietly resented him ever since. My widowed mom
was stressed and overwhelmed. She couldn't "build" me for success; she
was too busy figuring out how to feed five kids and keep the
electricity on.

But I always felt like a winner. I knew I
was unique and creative and my "voice" was powerful. Never felt like
some supermodel, but I always appreciated my looks. I could play them
down or pump them up. Strong, healthy. Maybe I wasn't "built" for
success but I would overcome the limitations of a difficult childhood
and faltering self-confidence. Fuck Michael Stipe.

So
what happened? Real life, I guess. You can want things with all of your
heart and soul and it doesn't mean you'll ever get them. Years go by,
and like my mother, you find yourself just trying to survive. Dreams
become a luxury for the privileged.

Or maybe I was the
lemon. No matter how hard I tried, I just didn't work right. My
internal mechanisms were just flawed and I'd just be one problem after
the next.

But purchasing my red truck reminded me that "luck"
and "success" aren't always what you think they'll be. Luck may be a
cool truck that lasts for years. Success may be teaching a young kid to
surf on his first try and seeing the huge smile on his face. Stardom
could be singing with your friend on a roof at midnight.

Maybe
Michael Stipe is wildly successful but has some weird eating disorder
or an all-consuming fetish for dirty socks. And undoubtedly, he has a
really nice car...but its not my truck and it never will be.

My
red truck reminded me that I'm not cursed. I'm not a lemon. Things do
work out for me, just not always in the ways I expected. And
now, I'll say goodbye to it. And I'll thank it because it did its job
and protected me to the very end. And it can't anymore. It's too old and
worn and tired.

I am my truck. Highly imperfect but built to last. Trustworthy, dependable and comfortable. Rusty but fabulous in its own way.

The
next phase of my life awaits me. I plan to leave this area and say
goodbye to one of the only places I've considered home. It no longer is
home. Like the truck, it used to be a safe haven but its not anymore. I
will try my "luck" again. And hopefully I'll buy a vehicle that's safe
and smart. But it will never be this truck.

My truck showed me
that every once in a while, even in some random ways, I can be lucky
too. (Or blessed...I never liked the idea of luck anyway.)

Sunday, April 07, 2013

Let's say I had a highly communicable disease called mondocrazyitis. It's so contagious, you might catch it standing in the same room as me. Even talking to me on the phone leaves you vulnerable.

Yet you still see me out in the world, sick as a damn dog, spreading my mondocrazyitis to the public at large. You'd think I was careless and just plain dangerous.

My point, you ask?

There are way too many untreated headcases out there with zero compulsion to treat their oh-so-obvious issues. And we have to deal with their crazy every day!

Whether its an addicted boyfriend or a bipolar boss or a hoarding
parent or a puking friend, these nutters just traipse around causing
chaos and often thinking they're so beyond mental help.

Why don't they do anything to fix themselves?

Symptoms that you’re an untreated kook:

You’re a hoarder. It’s not healthy to bury yourself alive in crap and shit. If you can’t open the doors in your home or your cat is sleeping on top of a pile of newspapers from 1972, you’ve got a problem. Get help!

You do weird things with food. You binge, purge, starve or store bread crusts in attics for emergencies. You're just act weird with food. And it's been going on for years. You think no one knows but everybody does. Get help!

You’re a love addict. You’ve been in a string of soul-sapping poisonous relationships for years yet you continue to pursue the same type of jerk as if your life depends on it. You tell others how amazing this guy is and how only you really, truly "get him." Get help!

You’re another kind of addict. Booze and drugs can be our good friends sometimes, but if you’re punching walls and puking every time you drink, hello, you probably have a problem that's been affecting others (jerk) for years. Get help!

You’re a sociopath and you know it. Oh sociopaths, you sneaky little mindfucks you. You manipulate others and mess up their lives and are never in the wrong for doing so. You're also the least likely to get help. Get help anyway, you heartless soul!

You’re unhappily married. Egad there are a gaggle of you, aren't there? “Doing it for the children” right? Solid rationale. Maybe they can be as miserable as you when they grow up and get in a relationship. That's all right. We simply adore your endless bickering and icy silences. Get help or divorce!

Yes, but does therapy really work?

Hell if I know...though I've spent thousands it anyway. Why? Because it beats blindly trampling through life with a problem that actively affects myself and others.

I have to manage my mental issues. It's my responsibility as a big girl in the real world. Because if something is broke, I have this wacky human tendency to want to fix it.

Do the same. Don’t let your dumb mental illness affect your own happiness or that of others. It’s your job as a human.

But if you choose to stay sick and avoid any form of self-examination and self-growth, please use a the mental equivalent of a Kleenex and cover your mouth when around others.

And every day, whether its at work or home or out in the world, people
like you and me are unwilling recipients to their free-floating mind
bugs.